When I joined Friendster in 2003, I uploaded my first avatar. It was Chuck Close's undeniably gritty and terrific "Big Self-Portrait" from the 1960s, dangling cigarette and all. When I joined Facebook a year later, I used the same one. Friends I hadn't seen for ages thought my life had taken a turn. »1/16/15 1:00pm 1/16/15 1:00pm

What if, the next time you played a video game, the main character not only looked like you but had the same body, same clothes, same everything? How would it change the way you related to the game? How would it change the way you relate to the other characters in it? I found out. »2/11/14 1:00pm 2/11/14 1:00pm

If you saw James Cameron's Avatar and thought "Hey now! That looks like a wise and wonderful way of existing in this world!" a Russian dreamer named Dmitry Itskov is the man you want to know. HIs "2045 Initiative" is modern, multi-billion dollar answer to the mortality. Or so he hopes it to be. »8/02/12 12:30am 8/02/12 12:30am

If you've been watching Twitter lately, more and more people are using animated Twitter avatars. They're eye-catching and cool, but how do you make them? It's not complicated, but as our friends at FWD point out in this handy guide, there are a few tricks that will make your clever GIF pop. [FWD] »6/20/12 4:00pm 6/20/12 4:00pm

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has installed in Newark Liberty, JFK, and LaGuardia airports an interactive avatar projected onto a plexiglass silhouette of a woman's body. Lost and disoriented travelers can ask her for help with things like getting to the correct gate, security checkpoint rules, and… »5/23/12 12:20am 5/23/12 12:20am

Unlike Tupac, BBC host James May doesn't have to be dead before we get an augmented reality version of him. Granted, this is not quite as thrilling as having a Hologram Tupac Shakur perform as if still living, but as far as museum guides go, an augmented reality miniature man is a pretty sweet deal. »4/28/12 12:20am 4/28/12 12:20am

Xbox's Avatar Kinect is pretty wild: It tracks and replicates your facial expressions with surprising precision. Which probably made you think about having a more realistic Avatar reppin' yourself owning up 12-year-olds in Halo, or something. But Microsoft Research's Photo-Real Talking Head project, which uses 2D… »2/25/11 2:00am 2/25/11 2:00am

This just seems wrong. A U.S businessman claims he's been sitting on 3D scans from 1996, when MJ was aged 37. It's rumored the singer wanted a virtual or robot double, and this data, if real, would enable just that. »11/18/09 12:40pm 11/18/09 12:40pm

Anyone who's upgraded to the New Xbox Experience knows that it gives a run on Wii's money as far as personal iconography is concerned. I just learned that you can look up peoples' avatars—as long as you have a gamertag of someone you love or hate, plug it in here and you'll see just how amazing or lame their gaming… »3/21/09 3:15am 3/21/09 3:15am

Click to view»9/20/08 11:15am 9/20/08 11:15amAs part of , an Xbox 360 firmware update coming at an undisclosed date, Microsoft has taken a lesson from Nintendo and added 3D cartoon avatars to the mix. In this clip, you can see just how robust the creation is—far more detailed and customizable than a Mii—though we can't help but to wonder if Miis…

Microsoft's just gone on the record with RPG-TV and said the
Fall Xbox 360 Dashboard Update »8/25/08 5:20pm 8/25/08 5:20pm will be hitting in November, which technically is still a part of Fall. Previous updates have also been released in late November (as close to Winter as you could push it while still being Fall), but all those coming this time…

Here's what we just learned from Microsoft in their round-table discussion on Xbox Live and the new Dashboard. First, the impetus for re-designing the dash was that the current content navigation is too difficult. They only planned on a couple hundred/thousand items, but they currently have 20,000+ pieces of content… »7/14/08 6:16pm 7/14/08 6:16pm

A recent patent filing by Apple Inc. entitled Enhancing Online Shopping Atmosphere indicates that Steve Jobs' next BOOM could involve a hat tip to virtual worlds like Second Life. According to the filing, Apple is considering a more interactive visual representation of its online store complete with changing weather… »4/20/08 7:00pm 4/20/08 7:00pm